Those rabbis are good at keeping the minds under control.
As a rabbi, I find that remark offensive.
So you're saying that the Hebrews watched Yahweh sitting/standing on the top of a 'mountain of fire' and, due to Yahweh reeling off a load of laws, the congregation decided to describe the law giving in very specific volcanic terms? Doesn't that sound a bit odd to you? Why volcanism?
Because it's not volcanism, and the covenant is more than just a recitation of laws.
You are choosing to read the descriptions-- in translation, by the way, not even in the original-- as descriptions of volcanism, and therefore that is what you see. If you read the account contextually, seeing how the Biblical authors were accustomed to employ imagery and idiom in their poetic style, and you understand that fire was very frequently a metaphor for power or for sanctity, you can see that it is not necessarily a literal account.
The establishment of the covenant is about God and the Jewish People establishing a permanent relationship with one another. It is an experience of spiritual and metaphysical power. Even the laws themselves are more than just lists of legislation, they are spiritual, moral, and mystical foundations for Jews to live lives that bring them closer to God.
In any case, though it may be beside the point, it's probably also worth noting that there are no volcanoes anywhere in the Sinai wilderness. If I recall right, the only volcanoes thought to have erupted within human history anywhere close to there are in Saudi Arabia and in Syria, unless you want to go all the way to the Greek islands.
If what you're saying is correct how can you de-mystify the fact the Hebrews were told to not go up or touch the mountain? They would 'surely be shot through' apparently.
They wouldn't be "shot through." They would be overcome by the divine presence. The danger was not physical. Human beings do not have the capacity to have unfiltered and direct interaction with God's presence in intense manifestation. The boundary was for our own protection from something that would not at all have been apparent-- such as physical phenomena.
So, the mountain is too hot to touch and it shoots out brimstone. What on earth does that have to do with law giving? Have you ever heard of a government shooting out balls of flaming brimstone while presenting new laws to the public? Can you imagine if today's journalists used volcanism when talking about politics? Ok, maybe they could use it metaphorically but not to such a degree it sets the entire scene and adds in totally irrelevant things. That would make for seriously bad journalism and the readers would be seriously confused. What's the reality behind the supposed metaphor of not touching a mountain of fire? If you are right and it was purely metaphorical, decode the metaphor for me.
Again, this is not about governments, politics, or regular law giving. This was about metaphysical and spiritual bonding, and the mystical creation of a holy way of life.
The mountain was not literally hot or shooting out brimstone: it was too holy for most people to be in sustained and unmediated contact with it while God's presence was manifesting there.
The fire and lightning and whatnot are images of natural power, to remind us that the God whom we covenanted with is the Creator of the universe.
You see, I think your rabbi is either horrible delluded (those in it the most are always the least able to recognise the truth) or he is a liar.
Actually, he seems to be neither. He seems to be thoughtful, sensitive, spiritual, imaginative, creative, and pluralistic. As opposed, for example, to your reading and defense of it, which seem simplistic, reductive, unimaginative and un-creative, contemptuous, and condescending.
The Exodus volcanism is not metaphorical at all. It is not poetic. Anyone who claims otherwise is kidding themselves, unless they've never appreciated metaphors or read poetry. It's the worst example of metaphorical poetry if it is metaphorical poetry, that is for sure.
First of all, you cannot judge, since you have not read the account in the original, and in context, with comprehension of how Biblical poetry and Jewish theological language work.
Second of all, you have no basis for saying that it is not poetry: it may not be poetry you appreciate, but that is a subjective aesthetic judgment.
They say it's metaphorical because the last thing they want you to do is read it literally.....looking for the reality....which is so easy to do it is unbelievable.
I honestly don't know which is more problematic: the fact that your relentless literalism implies that the Biblical authors were singularly incapable of complex and creative thought about spirituality, or the unremitting contempt you seem to have for the Hebrew Scriptures, the people who wrote them, and the people who hold them sacred.
In either case, it seems to me that your experience of reading the Hebrew scriptures might benefit from both further study and from a little more use of imagination.
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how can you de-mystify the fact the Hebrews were told to not go up or touch the mountain? They would 'surely be shot through' apparently. So, the mountain is too hot to touch and it shoots out brimstone. What on earth does that have to do with law giving? Have you ever heard of a government shooting out balls of flaming brimstone while presenting new laws to the public? Can you imagine if today's journalists used volcanism when talking about politics? Ok, maybe they could use it metaphorically but not to such a degree it sets the entire scene and adds in totally irrelevant things. That would make for seriously bad journalism and the readers would be seriously confused. What's the reality behind the supposed metaphor of not touching a mountain of fire? If you are right and it was purely metaphorical, decode the metaphor for me.
